


Just A Start

by ImaginationReaper98



Category: Star Wars Episode VII: The Force Awakens (2015)
Genre: Burgeoning Romance, F/M, Nightmares
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-05-27
Updated: 2016-05-27
Packaged: 2018-07-10 12:41:53
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,368
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6985588
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ImaginationReaper98/pseuds/ImaginationReaper98
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>When nightmares plague her sleep, Rey sneaks out and finds comfort beneath an X-wing. At one instance, an unexpected guest accompanied her in her safe haven. Forming friendship and a subtle blossoming romance.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Just A Start

Rey heard a faint sound of footsteps. Living alone as a scavenger made her hearing keen and alert, and judging from what she was hearing, the source of the sound was getting closer. She hugs her legs tighter as if it would make her seem smaller, somehow trying to hide herself deeper into the dark of the night. She was hunched down near an X-wing. A nightmare just disturbed her sleep, it wasn't the normal dreams haunting her now. Not the island, not the planet surrounded with a vast ocean. It was something far worse, something terrible.

Rey was able to creep out of the base silently, another skill she procured as a scavenger. The cool night air calmed her down and the smell of the X-wing's engines was always a comfort to her. It was her favorite spot. She would stay here until the faintest light of the sun would start to peek out of the shadows, hoping her spirits would do the same.

The footsteps got louder, closer. Rey decided to ignore it, who the hell would check under an X-wing at night? No one would, she guessed. And it's too dark for anyone to see her if ever that person would pass by. No one would expect anyone to be out here this late.

How wrong she was.

A beam of light was directed at her, Rey squinted, frozen in place.

"Rey? Is that you?" Poe Dameron ducked down under the X-wing, his face slightly bemused. "Didn't expect to see you here."

"Yes, but please point that away from me."

"Oh, sorry." he said. He seemed unperturbed seeing her out here. Considering the situation, alone in the dead of night under an X-wing instead of sleeping in the comfort of her bed, Rey was expecting a much more shocked or even a reprimanding reaction. Instead, Poe seemed to welcome her company. The problem was, Rey wasn't sure she did too.

Poe squats down and his eyes wandered around the X-wing they're under. "Hope you're not trying to mess up this beauty."

"I wouldn't dare." Rey said.

"Good, but I wouldn't say no if you want to take a look at it. BB-8 said that your a really good mechanic. My baby's got it bad under that oscillator. I actually went here to check if the techs took care of it."

So this is his X-wing, Rey thought. She suddenly felt like she was probably intruding. But Poe's friendly face suggests that he doesn't care.

"You're checking it late at night?" asked Rey.

"You're sitting under it late at night?" Poe shot back. "Not that I have problem about it, I don't. To answer your question, I just couldn't sleep, so I thought I could just, go here. Couldn't sleep too huh?"

"Yes, unfortunately."

Poe sat down. He took out a small circular object from his pocket that looked like a silver bulb. He tapped it with his finger and the bulb flickered to life. Poe put the spherical bulb between them and with the faint white light, they could see each other much clearly.

"You probably know this by now, but everyone here has been talking about you, non-stop." Poe said.

Rey just nodded. She does know. The murmured praises, the admiring stares, it was hard not to notice even though she pretends she doesn't.

"They said you outflew a number TIE fighters in Jakku, in the Millennium Falcon. The Millennium Falcon! That's really something you know."

"Finn handled the weapons, It wasn't just me." Rey said.

Poe shrugged. "Doesn't change anything. I know Finn's good with weapons, I've seen him myself, but you wouldn't have got out of there alive if you weren't a good pilot. And you flew it alone too. Anyway, how'd you learn how to fly?" Poe asked, his eyes were filled with pure curiousity and fascination.

"It's nothing interesting." Rey said.

Poe raised his eyebrows, a comical smirk playing on his lips. "Try me."

Rey sighed.

"Okay, here it goes," she cleared her throat. "I was scavenging on a crashed Zephra-series hauler one day and found a stash of data chips. I went through each of them then I found three of them with their programs intact. To my surprise, one of them was a flight simulator." She paused. Poe was now resting his chin on his hand, listening intently with the same beguiled expression. The gnawing feeling left by the nightmare slowly dissipates, talking about flying always cheered her up.

"I had loads of free time back in Jakku, especially when there's a storm and I can't get out. So I tried it. After being able to go through being terrible, I stopped crashing and got the hang of it. Sometimes I would sneak inside the ships in Niima outpost at night, owned by a dealer named Unkar Plutt. So yeah, that's how I learned how to fly."

"Hmm. So, how many types of ship can you fly?" Poe asked.

"I don't really know exactly. But I flew a variety of ships in the simulator. Freighters, fighters, a lot actually. But I haven't tried them all out in reality." She then remembered the feeling she gets after triumphantly going through a flight sim then realizing it was all just illusions, it wasn't real and it could not happen in reality. Like a little kid getting excited with having a balloon then it just suddenly pops. This sad recollection made her voice lose its cheerful tone.

"You know, I couldn't."

Rey looked away, Poe saw she was obviously upset, and he always hates seeing people that way.

"Well, let me tell you this," he said, trying to cheer her back up. "Right now, that's not the case you know. You could."

He can't really imagine what her life was like back in Jakku, he doesn't want to ask either, but he knows it must have been hard. The way Rey talks about flying, the way her eyes flicker with pure innocent joy, he's reminded of himself. That young boy who always wanted to fly his mother's fighter ship on the back of their house.

Rey looked back at Poe. She realized he was right, she could. It was only now that she fully realized it. All those years of being afraid of leaving, of hoping for something that deep down she knows will never happen. She doesn't have to only daydream about all the things she ever wanted to do. She could.

Rey saw that Poe was looking at her, smiling. Not smirking, not grinning, just smiling. It was a good look on him. He held out his hand and said, "Nice to meet you Rey."

"But, we've already met before." she said to him. His smile just widened.

"I know. But I think this is actually the right time to do this."

They shook hands, laughing. Rey felt better, although the horrible sensation that the nightmares gave her was so far from being lost, it didn't leave her hopeless. 

Rey looked at Poe, carefree and playful, and realized no one could've guessed by looking at him that he has experienced terror, danger and pain. It might have broke him and took away that happy glow in his eyes, but it didn't, and she knew why. 

As a new wave of horrors entered Rey's life, of which she cannot escape now, she was reminded of that feeling she got when she flew the Millennium Falcon. The exhilaration, her adrenaline surging as the screams of the TIE fighters rang in her ears. The priceless and pure joy that the glorious roar of the Falcon induced her. It was always in her, the desire for heroic adventures. She could tell Poe has it. And she has seen it in Han Solo himself in the brief but meaningful time that she got to know him. 

She tried to bury this desire deep inside her back in Jakku, when she once treated it as a mere distraction. But her life has changed dramatically since then, and it was time to embrace it, like the way she embraced the Force.

It was just a start of a new life for her, imperfect but still promising.


End file.
